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| 2021-04-13 15:30:11
(Movie Review) Seobok
(Movie Review) 'Seobok' asks philosophical questions about life, death
By Kim Boram
SEOUL, April 13 (Yonhap) -- The upcoming blockbuster "Seobok" is named after a sorcerer who sought an elixir of life in the ancient Qin Dynasty of China.
Director and writer Lee Young-joo, who returns to the big screen nine years after his hit romance drama "Architecture 101" (2012), portrays the human fear of death and the desire for immortality through a human clone that possesses the secrets to eternal life.
Its beginning follows a common action movie plot. Ki-hun (Gong Yoo) is a retired agent but secretly assigned to move the first human clone, Seobok (Park Bo-gum), to a safe place.
The duo is tracked by a group of secret agents who try to destroy the human clone and Seoin, the company behind the confidential cloning project, that wants to use the human clone as the elixir of life and rule the human world.
But the journey of Ki-hun, who is suffering from a terminal illness and has only one year left to live, and Seobok, an offspring of a DNA modification who lives an eternal life, is not just a blood-splattered escape movie as expected but also a philosophical exploration.
They keep asking questions about the finite life and its ending that every human has to face but a human clone doesn't.
Ki-hun says it is painful to go through life filled with guilty feelings after betraying his colleague a few years ago. Nevertheless, he admits that he doesn't want to end his life here and finds a glimmer of hope that his fatal disease can be cured by Seobok.
Seobok, who knows he is trapped in the endless life, asks Ki-hun whether his entire life is painful and what the fear of death feels like. The clone says he hopes to be meaningful and worthwhile even in his unlimited time.
From this point, "Seobok" is not a typical sci-fi film that shows the creation and the dangerous use of human clones or power struggles over the secret project. It casts philosophical questions about the attitudes toward fear of death and desire for immortality.
The on-screen chemistry between South Korea's two heartthrobs of Gong Yoo and Park Bo-gum, their frequent jokes and humorous tones in dialogue lighten up the film's heavy atmosphere and figurative message.
Also, it has enough eye-catching attractions, including gun fights and car chase scenes, to convince people that the 16 billion-won (US$14.2 million) project is one of the most anticipated films in the yearlong pandemic era.
But the director seems to have lost the film's beauty as a sci-fi blockbuster or a rare Korean title on human cloning to indulge in the philosophical study of human fear of death and mortality.
"Seobok" will be released simultaneously in theaters and via streaming media Tving this Thursday.
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